Practicality

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Baum does not speak the language of luxury. He speaks simply of building bikes people want.

“If people come in for a true purpose of what they want to use it for, it is better for us. We can match it to those ideas," he says. Baum works with the dreams of cyclists lying in pieces around him.

At the beginning the dreams take the shape of a pile of titanium tubes, or a piece of paper marked with a few measurements. Those measurements encompass the whole range of riders.

“We have our own style and we draw people who like our style, but in the one week I have worked with
Cadel Evans
and fitted a grandmother who hadn’t been on a bike for 40-plus years. For me the strangest thing about that week is that I got enjoyment out of working for both."

Injured by a car whilst attempting to break into cycling’s top ranks aged 17, Baum was forced to start thinking about bicycle fit while his contemporaries went on to race at the top levels.

“I ended up with a muscle imbalance and I worked on a lot of theories and ideas on trying to solve that, so I made bikes to make that happen," he says.

An apprenticeship in aerospace engineering gave him the confidence to make his first bike as a teenager around 1989.

Keeping fresh

He doesn’t own any bikes he hasn’t made, but he throws his leg over a Trek or a Giant regularly.

“I try to ride as many different types of bike as possible to keep an eye on what other people are doing, and to keep fresh," he says. “I wouldn’t dare to say that we have got it right or how we do it is the only way to do it."

The workshop operates primarily with titanium and aluminium, making road bikes, mountain bikes and touring bikes.

They cost between $7000 and $20,000 and Baum does not apologise for being at the top of the market.

“That gave me a lot more room to move, he says.

Bikes are customised to the rider’s size, obviously, but what makes his eponymous rides stand out is the attention to aesthetics. Customers can call the shots, Baum explains.

“They may be an author and they are matching the book cover," he says.

“We have people come in with a wedding ring and they want that colour of the stone in their paint work. We have had a number of people that have received a frame or a bike instead of an engagement ring. I find that quite strange."